Panic, persecutions and penalties

The impact of Fr. Augustine Urayai’s new theology of original sin on the Roman Catholic Church in Zimbabwe

Abstract

This article critically examines the impact of Fr. Augustine Urayai’s alternative theory of original sin in the Roman Catholic Dioceses of Masvingo and Gweru. Persecutions and penalties have been imposed on those who sympathize with his new theology. Fr. Urayai held that the fall of Satan and the rebel angels described in the book of Revelation is the actual original sin, not the traditionally accepted biblical Adamic guilt recorded in Genesis. This article provides both the milieu and context within which Fr. Urayai’s theory emerged and developed, and examines the impact on the Zimbabwe Roman Catholic Church.